Tag Archives: Camino de Santiago

An Extraordinary Opportunity to Learn how to Produce and Direct a Feature Film.

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Very soon, my wife and producing partner, Jennifer Cluff, and I will embark on a new movie—the companion film to the highly successful The Way, My Way.

It’s called The Way, Her Way, and it follows a woman’s transformational journey along the Portuguese Camino.

It will be our nineteenth movie over a forty-year period.

You can learn more about the film, its story and the team behind it at thewayherwaymovie.com.

For the first time ever, we are offering four placements as Producer and Director Attachments, providing rare inside access to our filmmaking process.

These will not be passive, watch-from-the-sidelines experiences.

The four successful applicants will be embedded within the production in Portugal and Spain and given direct access to Jennifer and me as we navigate the creative, logistical and financial challenges of making an international feature film.

They will witness the decisions that shape a movie: casting, rehearsals, locations, scheduling, production design, directing actors, choosing camera coverage and solving the inevitable problems that arise during filming.

For the Full-Production Attachments, that access will continue through editing, music, sound, grading, marketing and distribution.

We will also be editing on location, allowing the Attachments to observe my decision-making as I work with the editor and begin shaping the movie while we are still shooting.

The Location Attachments

We are offering two four-week Location Attachments:

  • One Director’s Attachment
  • One Producer’s Attachment

The successful applicants will join us in Portugal for the crucial final week of pre-production, followed by three weeks embedded with the production during principal photography in Portugal and Spain.

The Director’s Attachment will have access to rehearsals, scene preparation, blocking, camera coverage, performance decisions, editing and the daily realities of directing a feature film.

The Producer’s Attachment will experience scheduling, location management, departmental coordination, budgeting and the constant practical and creative decisions required to keep an international production moving.

The Producer’s Attachment will also be given insight into the film’s finance plan, how Jennifer and I raised the money, and how producers work with investors, distributors and international sales agents. Access to commercially sensitive information will necessarily be subject to confidentiality and third-party permissions.

Each Location Attachment will receive an official individual screen credit on The Way, Her Way as either:

Director’s Attachment

or

Producer’s Attachment

The production will also submit the credits to IMDb following completion of the film.

The total program fee for each four-week Location Attachment is US$20,000.

The Full-Production Attachments

We are also offering two Full-Production Attachments:

  • One Full-Production Director’s Attachment
  • One Full-Production Producer’s Attachment

These will cover the complete filmmaking journey.

The Full-Production Director’s Attachment will be involved from early pre-production through principal photography, post-production, completion and the premiere of the finished film.

The successful applicant will participate in scheduled creative and production meetings, join us throughout the location shoot and follow the film through editing, music, sound design, ADR, the creation of the musical score, sound mixing and colour grading.

The Attachment will also experience market-test screenings, our response to those screenings, any subsequent changes to the film, and finally its premiere.

They will see not only how a film is shot, but how story and performance are refined in the editing room—and how hundreds of individual creative choices come together to produce the finished movie.

The Full-Production Producer’s Attachment will have access to areas of filmmaking that are rarely discussed openly: raising finance, constructing finance plans, recoupment waterfalls, working with investors, liaising with distributors and international sales agents, production accounting, audits, delivery requirements and completion obligations.

The Attachment will then follow the film into marketing and distribution: creating key art, trailers and the electronic press kit; developing publicity; and working with the distributor on release strategy.

It will be a thorough, real-world masterclass in how an independent feature film is produced, completed, marketed and brought to an audience.

Each Full-Production Attachment will receive an official individual screen credit on The Way, Her Way as either:

Full-Production Director’s Attachment

or

Full-Production Producer’s Attachment

The production will also submit the credits to IMDb following completion of the film.

The total program fee for each Full-Production Attachment is US$50,000.

Who Are We Looking For?

These Attachments are intended for emerging or established filmmakers, people seriously considering moving into directing or producing, or anyone with a passionate interest in understanding how a feature film is made from the inside.

No film-school qualification is required, and prior professional experience is not essential.

What matters is curiosity, commitment, creative intelligence, professionalism and the ability to work harmoniously within the intense environment of a film production.

Payment of the program fee does not guarantee acceptance.

Jennifer and I will personally select each applicant based on their aspirations, motivation, maturity, suitability for the production environment and what they hope to gain from the experience.

The program fees will help support both the delivery of the Attachment Program and the production of The Way, Her Way. They are not investments and provide no ownership, copyright, profit participation, recoupment entitlement or financial return from the film.

Important Information

  • Only four Attachments will be offered worldwide.
  • The Attachments are educational and observational positions. Participants will not replace employed crew members or be required to perform work for the production.
  • Access will be extensive but subject to production requirements, cast and crew privacy, confidentiality, safety and third-party permissions.
  • The production will meet accommodation, meal and production-related internal travel costs while participants are embedded on location.
  • Attachments must pay for their international travel, including airfares to and from Portugal and Spain.
  • Attachments must obtain appropriate travel and medical insurance and meet their personal expenses.
  • Unless otherwise agreed, any travel and accommodation associated with post-production activities and the premiere will be the responsibility of the participant.
  • Post-production, marketing and domestic distribution will take place in Australia.
  • Distribution throughout Australia and New Zealand is already in place through Maslow Entertainment.
  • Successful applicants will enter into a formal Attachment Agreement before any payment is accepted.

Anticipated Dates

  • 5 October 2026: Final week of pre-production begins in Porto, Portugal
  • 12 October 2026: Principal photography commences
  • Early May 2027: Intended premiere

Production dates may change. The Attachment Agreement will set out what will happen in the event of postponement or any material alteration to the production schedule.

I’d suggest if you’re interested, you get in fast because there’s not much time before we go into pre-production, and I suspect these attachments will go quickly.

Who Are We?

Jennifer Cluff and I have been making critically acclaimed—and sometimes commercially successful—films for more than forty years.

We are unusual in the world of independent filmmaking. Very few filmmaking partnerships have demonstrated the durability that ours has.

Our first feature, A Street to Die (1985), screened at the Sundance Film Festival and subsequently won the Crystal Globe for Best Picture at the prestigious Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

I received three Australian Film Institute Award nominations—now known as the AACTA Awards—for Best Film as producer, Best Director and Best Original Screenplay.

Our second film, Backlash (1986), was invited into Official Selection at the Cannes Film Festival and subsequently acquired for North American distribution by the Samuel Goldwyn Company. Following its Cannes screening, it sold into almost every major international territory and played at many of the world’s leading film festivals. I wrote, directed and produced the film.

Other career highlights include a second film in Official Selection at Cannes, Malpractice (1989); four films screening at the Toronto International Film Festival; and my film-noir cult classic Kiss or Kill receiving twelve AFI Award nominations.

Kiss or Kill won five AFI Awards, including Best Film and Best Director, and was released theatrically throughout North America by Universal Pictures. It also received a gala screening at the New York Film Festival. Once again, I wrote, directed and produced the film.

There was also a brief stint in Hollywood, where I directed the Warner Bros. romantic comedy Two If by Sea, starring Sandra Bullock. That was not a happy experience for me. I discovered I was not a director for hire.

Instead, over the decades, I developed my producing and writing skills so that Jennifer and I could continue making films about subjects that genuinely matter to us.

The four successful applicants will be the rare recipients of that combined knowledge and experience.

For further information about The Way, Her Way, visit thewayherwaymovie.com.

How to Apply

Please send us:

  • A short biography or professional résumé
  • Whether you are applying for a directing or producing Attachment
  • Whether you are interested in a Location or Full-Production Attachment
  • A short statement explaining why you would like to join us
  • What you hope to learn from the experience
  • Confirmation that you are available for the relevant dates
  • Any questions you may have

Expressions of interest should be sent to:

caminofilmprods@gmail.com

Applications close:

13 Sept

Making a movie is exhilarating, exhausting, demanding and occasionally terrifying.

It is also one of the most collaborative and rewarding creative experiences imaginable.

This is an opportunity to experience that process from the inside while helping us bring The Way, Her Way to the screen.

Buen Camino,

Bill Bennett

Age & Risk

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I had a very interesting conversation yesterday over New Year’s Day lunch with a family friend who’s a quantum physicist. We talked about age and risk. He argued very strongly that as you get older, you should take more risks because you have less to lose.

This bloke has his doctorate in Quantum Physics, he lives and works in Canberra and he’s at the cutting edge of quantum research. In his spare time he goes rock climbing. Like, hanging upside down four hundred feet off the ground clinging to the sides of a vertical cliffs with his fingernails.

I asked him if he ever got scared. He said yeah, all the time. But that’s the joy of it. That led to the conversation about risk profiles and age. Here’s a tidied-up transcript of the conversation:

PAT: Well, the theory centres around the fact that most people in their lives front load the majority of the risk to their younger years – then as they age, they risk less and less, even retreating into boredom and monotony as they get older, where the only risk is just time itself. That time is running out.

The average age of death for males in Australia is, what, 81 years. And so the idea is that you should, in fact, be risking more as you age, doing riskier things that you might die from, that give you some kind of exhilaration or life experience that has some value to you. Because when you’re 70, you’re gambling 11 years of your life to do this thing. If you do that thing when you’re 20, you’re gambling 61 years.

How much is time worth compared to the payoff of doing the extremely dangerous thing versus the possible outcome of you ceasing to exist? Not necessarily dangerous, but risky. So it could be financial risk, could be any kind of risk. But a lot of people just front load that, and then the last years of their life, they don’t take any risks at all, when the consequences become quite small.

I see this happening with people doing bucket lists when they’ve got some relatively short term life-threatening diagnosis or something. But then again I guess there isn’t even a risk then, is there? Because they’ve left it so late there isn’t actually anything on the table. Whereas if you decided to do that 10 years earlier, just on the chance, hmm? You’ve got so much more potential payoff if it all goes well.

Take the Camino. Somebody who’s got a heart condition at age 65 decides to walk the Camino. They’re gambling 81 minus 65 years – 16 years. The risk is that they’re going to die on this long walk. But if they don’t die, then the payoff could be huge. It could transform their lives. The walk could, in some way, heal them. Or prove that the doctors might have been wrong and you’re not as ill as they thought you were.

It also comes to the fact that life is very nonlinear in time. Some of your time is very short, and some of it’s very long, but the clock ticks at the same rate, all the way through your life. But it doesn’t in your head. So when you’re on the Camino, right, that could be a valuable time in your life.

Let’s say you do the walk in a month. You could have spent that month sitting on your couch at home. That would be the safe option. That would be the less riskier option. But sitting at home on your couch, have you gotten a month’s worth of value out of it? Whereas spending that month walking the Camino, taking the risk that you could die from heart failure, during that month you’ve experienced joy, a sense of achievement, you’ve made new friends, perhaps you’ve taken on new ideas.

Perhaps at the end of that month you’ve become a different person.

That one month walking the Camino, as against sitting at home on the couch, might be worth six months, twelve months. More. It’s all very nonlinear.

People should gamble more as they get older. But they don’t. They tend to withdraw. They tend to… sort of cocoon themselves. They tend to increase their protection levels, don’t they? They get comfortable, and I think a lot of society says that you’ve earned the right to be comfortable. Like, that’s what retirement is. You’re safe. There will be no big changes because you’ve done everything right. Because you’ve fought your way through life up to that point. But then… why?

Now, you’ve retired and you’ve got 20-maybe 30 years of doing nothing. Why not make that a time for taking risks – doing exciting things? The clock’s ticking down. And you’ve got less to lose. Instead of withdrawing as you get older, why not take some huge risks?

Audit of 2025 & plans for 2026

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As readers of this blog know, each year around this time I do an “audit” of what I achieved this year pegged against what I hoped to achieve this time last year. And I outline what I hope to achieve in the coming year.

This year was all about the international theatrical rollout of The Way, My Way.

After a successful cinema run throughout Australia and New Zealand in 2024, the film that some reviewers called “the surprise hit of the year” – with a cinema Box Office of close to $2.5m, and a run of 20 weeks in some cinemas – it was time to take the film overseas.

Jennifer and I left Australia on January 28th, and for the next 4 months we toured the film throughout the US, Canada, Germany, with sold out screenings as well in the UK and Italy.

In the US and Canada we did 48 Q&A screenings in 44 different cities and towns in 19 states over a 51 day period. During this time Jennifer and I:

  • took 12 internal flights
  • took 52 Ubers
  • I drove 7,000 kms in five rental cars

Johnnie Walker, Camino legend, joined us for a couple of weeks and he was treated by the Q&A crowds as the rock star that he is. Marc Wooldridge, head of Maslow Entertainment, helped coordinate our trip from Australia, with the aid of our US co-distributor, Outsider Pictures.

We arrived back home on May 28th – we were away exactly four months. Was it exhausting? Strangely, no. Jennifer and I were sensible. We slept well and we ate sparingly. And we traveled super light. That was key, with being on the move constantly.

During the last couple of weeks of the tour, in amongst all the travel and screenings, I began writing a new novel – an Outback thriller I’d been developing over the past ten years or so. It’s called Lady Fix – No Man’s Land. When I got home I continued writing for the next seven months, and this occupied my time for pretty much the rest of the year.

Publishers Penguin Random House had previously published my YA supernatural thriller trilogy, Palace of Fires –

https://www.penguin.com.au/brand/palace-of-fires

PRH were tracking the progress of Lady Fix and I submitted it to them last month. They came back with notes, which was expected, and I’m currently working through those notes. I also signed with a top flight literary agent and she will guide me through this process.

I got a delightful surprise last month as well – I was awarded the Malaspinsa Award from the Spanish Ambassador in Canberra for strengthening cultural ties between Australia and Spain for my Camino memoir and film, The Way, My Way.,

So, how did I go with my laundry list of things I wanted to achieve this year? Here’s what I hoped to achieve this time last year, and in bold, what I actually did or did not achieve.

  • Release The Way, My Way in US and Canada – and support that release with a Q&A tour, from the beginning of February to the end of March.
  • Done.
  • Release The Way, My Way in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and support that release with a Q&A tour in April.
  • Done.
  • Screen The Way, My Way to an annual gathering of North American pilgrims in Vancouver in mid May.
  • Done.
  • Screen The Way, My Way to a convention of Camino leaders in Malta at the end of May.
  • Done.
  • Walk the Portuguese Camino (for the 3rd time!) in preparation for the shoot of The Way, Her Way.
  • Didn’t do this. No time.
  • Release The Way, My Way later in the year in Italy, and support that release.
  • Done.
  • Shoot The Way, Her Way on the Portuguese Camino in September / October.
  • Didn’t do this. Not sufficient time to properly prepare with the international touring of The Way, My Way.
  • Work on the post production of The Way, Her Way.
  • Didn’t do this. See above.
  • Write the first draft screenplay of the next movie in my Camino series – called The Way, His Way. (I aim to become the Taylor Sheridan of the Camino! haha)
  • Didn’t do this.
  • Complete the writing of my metaphysical thriller, Dead Image.
  • Didn’t do this. Instead wrote Lady Fix.
  • Complete the writing of my non fiction book, If I can Change, You can Too.
  • Didn’t do this. My time was spent writing Lady Fix.
  • Write a treatment of my dysfunctional pensioner crime-caper screenplay.
  • Didn’t do this.
  • Shoot more material for the Hope film.
  • Didn’t do this.

As you can see, I didn’t do a lot of what I’d hoped to do. I think in retrospect I was way too ambitious in my expectations. I didn’t realise how all-consuming the international Q&A tour would be, and how writing a new novel – Lady Fix – would suck up all my remaining time and headspace.

Writing a novel is hard.
Damn hard.

So what do I hope to achieve in 2026?
I only have two things I wish to achieve:

  • Get The Way, Her Way made.
  • Get Lady Fix published.

If I can achieve those two things then I’ll regard 2026 a successful year.

Here’s the website for The Way, Her Way:
https://thewayherwaymovie.com

On the health front, I end the year in my eighth year since diagnosis of my Parkinson’s disease. This year, I’ve taken a bit of a hit, what with the four months of intensive travelling. But even so, I thank my lucky stars that I’m as good as I am.

Jennifer is my rock,

The Way, My Way available online NOW!

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I’m delighted to announce that our Camino movie, The Way, My Way, is now available online in most major territories worldwide.

Thank you to all those who’ve been waiting so patiently.

It’s available to rent or buy from Apple TV in these territories:
United States
Canada
Ireland
Portugal
United Kingdom

and

Amazon Prime in these territories:
United States
Canada
United Kingdom
Ireland (through UK storefront)
France
Spain
Portugal (through Spain storefront)
Brazil
Mexico
Latin America (through Mexico storefront)

It will also be available to rent or buy on YouTube Premium very soon. Online releases in Germany, Italy and Taiwan will be at the discretion of their local distributors.

Please note: the film will not be on Netflix in the foreseeable future, simply because they haven’t made us an offer to buy it!

Thank you to all those who saw the film in a cinema. Now’s your chance to see it in the comfort of your own home!

It might also make a good Christmas gift!

Day #1 – 6 day Sept Fast (recap)

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Here’s how I start my day – with a double espresso.
Even when I fast.
No sugar. No milk. Just two shots of pure espresso.

Usually by day 4 of a fast my body decides that it doesn’t need caffeine anymore, and I can’t bring myself to drink it. I shift across to either Green Tea or First Flush Darjeeling.

Day #1 of my fast wasn’t so bad. I felt hungry but not hugely so. I weighed myself this morning and in just one day I’ve lost 2.1kgs. This is largely water and in subsequent days this loss will come down to about 1kg per day, sometimes less.

The hardest thing about fasting for any period, whether it’s 1 day or 6 days or 14 days, which is the longest fast I’ve done, is to fully commit to it. If you waver in your commitment, even in the slightest, you won’t last the fast!

It’s a little bit like walking a Camino, or making a movie, or writing a book, or entering into a relationship. You have to approach it with full commitment.

My Stats:
Weight: 84.6kg
BP: 148/78
Resting Pulse: 65 bpm

My blood pressure is a bit high. I should be in the 125-129/ 68-75 range. My resting pulse is a bit high too – it should be under 60bpm. It’ll be interesting to see how these shift over the length of the fast.

The Way, My Way – news of online release!

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For those of waiting to see The Way, My Way, or for those who’ve already seen it and want to see it again – I have some good news.

The film is scheduled to be released on Video On Demand (VOD) this November, on various platforms (e.g. Amazon Prime and Apple TV) and in a number of countries around the world, including the US, the UK, Spain, and some of the larger Spanish speaking Latin America countries.  

Please note the film will not to be on Netflix in the near term (and it may actually never be on Netflix), and so at this time, VOD is the only way to legitimately watch and enjoy the film.

Jennifer and I would like to thank you all for your patience in the lead up to the VOD release. Rest assured, we’ve tried our darnedest to make the film available in as many cinemas as possible around the world, but getting distribution for independent films like ours is getting harder and harder these days. 

But at least there’ll be the option to see it in your home very soon, and that pleases us greatly.

And if you’re needing an excuse to upgrade your home entertainment system to wide screen Ultra 4K, home cinema surround sound, the VOD release is all the excuse you need!

I’ll come back to you once we’ve got an exact date for the release – but November it is!

We’re back!

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After 4 months on the road traveling with our movie The Way, My Way, we’re finally back at home in Mudgee – and my goodness, it’s great to be sleeping in our own bed again.

It was an extraordinary trip –

  • 8 weeks in the US and Canada doing Q&A screenings,
  • Three weeks in Germany supporting the film’s theatrical release.
  • A side trip to Hungary for a special screening in Budapest with our dear friends Balazs and Laszlo – both feature in the film.
  • Three weeks or so in England, Scotland and Wales.
  • Then back to Canada and Vancouver to attend the annual North American Gathering of Camino pilgrims with a special screening.
  • Then back to Europe and Malta to attend the European Assembly of Camino pilgrims, with screenings for the Spanish Ambassador, the Australian High Commissioner, and other dignitaries.
  • Then from Malta back to London then back home!

Overnight I slept for nine hours straight.
I never sleep nine hours straight!

I have emails long overdue need replying to, finances to sort, social media needs attending to, plus I started writing a new novel while I was away and I have a deadline in two weeks to deliver the first 25k words to Penguin Random House. Then there’s the sequel to The Way, My Way that Jennifer and I are starting to ramp up – not to mention kick starting my exercise routine once again, getting my eating regime back on track, and so on and so forth!

I never want to travel again.

Until August, when I have to go back to California for more stem cell treatment for my Parkinson’s.

I tell you what though, I love Australia.
I’m proud to be an Australian.
We’re not without our faults and problems, as with any country –
But I’d prefer to live here than anywhere else in the world.
And in Mudgee in particular.
With Jennifer.

Now, back to work!

Germany, Hungary & Beyond ~

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Our mammoth global tour of The Way, My Way, continues.

We’ve been in Germany now more than three weeks. We’ve driven the length and breadth of the country in a rented (and brand new) Audi A5 that has a warning badge on the dashboard that says I’m not allowed to drive it faster than 220 km/hr.

Damn.
And I was wanting to hit 250!

The autobahns here allow drivers to go however fast they want. Some must be hitting 260km/hr easy. They flash past in their Mercedes and BMWs and Porches (and yes, Audis too) You see them as a speck in the rearview then they’re there and then they’re not there.

It’s a wonder there aren’t more horrific accidents.

But unlike speedsters in Texas or Florida, the Germans are incredibly safe and disciplined drivers. It’s actually more dangerous driving on Australian highways where the speed limit is a mind-numbingly slow 100 km/hr. At least on German highways you have to stay fully focused the whole time.

Enough of German driving conditions!

So far I’ve driven about 2,500 kms up and down and around the country so that Jennifer and I can attend the various Q&A screenings set up for us by the film’s German distributor, Happy Entertainment, led by Thomas Steger.

(too much headroom!)

Thomas and his team have done a terrific job preparing the film for its general release on 80+ screens across the country, and Austria, on April 24th/25th. He’s geared the film’s campaign specifically for a German audience – and I have to say the audiences have responded to the film differently to Australian or American audiences.

Australian audiences were a little shy and tentative and dare I say it, initially suspicious that an Australian film could be any good. But the film ended up having a 20 week run. In America and Canada, the audiences were enthusiastic and exuberant right from the getgo.

The German audiences are a little more restrained – and this could be cultural or it could be a function of the dubbing and translation – however they have been no less impacted by the subtle power of the film, as have audiences elsewhere, and the Q&As have been largely fully attended and the questions have indicated a deep engagement with the material.

During our time here we’ve been able to hang out with our dear friend Rudi Wiesmeier, who lives in a beautiful village south of Munich and whose support of the movie brought it into creation.

(perfect headroom!)

His two friends, brothers Jonas and Julian Bachmann, featured in the film as the musicians in the Hontanas party scene, then later in the snail scene. (“Mein Gott! Ist er tot?”) They saw the film in Munich and loved it.

(forgivable headroom)

Tomorrow we drive 400km+ to Leipzig, for a screening there – then to Berlin for a screening there – then we fly to Budapest in Hungary for a special screening hosted by our Camino buddies Balazs and Laszlo – stars of the film. That’s on Sunday 27th April.

From there we go to the UK for about ten days, then we fly back to Canada for a screening at a big annual Camino Gathering in Vancouver, then we fly to Malta for a similar screening with European Camino leaders – then… we fly back home.

We’ll have been away four months.
I wonder what the lawn’s like?

(unforgivable headroom!)

The Way, My Way finishes its US & Canada Q&A tour – for now!

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This afternoon Jennifer and I did our final Q&A in Carson City, near Lake Tahoe, in Nevada.

It was our 48th Q&A screening in 44 different towns/cities in 51 days.

We attended screenings in these states and provinces:

  • Arizona
  • New Mexico
  • Colorado
  • Texas
  • Florida
  • Ohio
  • Indiana
  • Illinois
  • Wisconsin
  • Washington DC
  • Virginia
  • New York
  • Ontario (province of Canada)
  • British Columbia (province of Canada)
  • Washington
  • Oregon
  • California
  • Nevada

I’ve driven 4,314 miles.
I’ve rented five vehicles.
We’ve taken 56 Ubers.
We’ve taken 12 internal flights.

You might think we’re utterly exhausted but actually we’re not.

Camino walking legend Johnnie Walker joined us for our NY, Canadian, Seattle, Portland OR and most of the Californian screenings. He was a big hit with the crowds. They loved him!

And he energised us.

But what’s really kept us going day to day, screening to screening, has been the audiences. Most of those 48 screenings were sellouts. In Ottawa we had a sellout crowd of 650. In San Rafael we had a sellout crowd of 340. Dan the manager there said he could have sold twice that number of tickets.

So even though it’s been a long haul for Jennifer and me, and Johnnie too – it’s been worth it! We’ve met some wonderful people, many of whom have become friends – and we’ve seen first hand the impact the film is having on people.

Before we left home we were concerned that the North American audiences maybe wouldn’t “get” the film. That’s turned out to be something we need not have worried about. The audience response throughout has been even more demonstrative than in Australia. And the Q&As have been vigorous and they’ve asked some fascinating questions.

There hasn’t been one screening where the audience hasn’t clapped twice – one when the film cuts to black at the end, and then again at the end of the credit roll. It’s been incredibly humbling – but also gratifying.

Behind all this has been the engine room of Paul Hudson, head of US based Outsider Pictures, and our Executive Producer Marc Wooldridge, head of Maslow Entertainment in Australia.

Tomorrow we drive from Carson City, Nevada, to Los Angeles where on Monday we fly out to Germany to meet up with another of our Executive Producers, Rudi Wiesmeier. The film is getting a major theatrical release in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

It premieres in Munich on April 8th, and Jennifer and I then begin a 12-15 city Q&A tour throughout Germany. Then we’re coming back to North America in early May for further screenings.

This film has a life of its own.
It’s now running on what we call: Pilgrim Power!

The Way, My Way Q&A tour – 4 wks in ~

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For the first time in nearly 4 weeks, we have a day off!

We’ve been going flat chat since the end of January – pretty much a new city, a new screening, every day.. Here’s where we’ve had screenings so far –

  • Phoenix
  • Sedona (2 screenings)
  • Flagstaff
  • Albuquerque
  • Santa Fe
  • Denver
  • Flat iron Crossing
  • Dallas
  • Austin
  • San Antonio
  • Houston
  • Jacskonville (screening cancelled – Valentine’s Day!)
  • Orlando
  • Miami (two screenings)
  • Cincinatti
  • Columbus
  • Indianapolis
  • Chicago (two screenings)
  • Milwaukee
  • Washington
  • Arlington

That’s 2,470 miles.
In 24 days.

I drove all this except for Cincinnati/Columbus/Indiapolis – these sectors we were very kindly driven by Brian and Michelle Coleman – 283miles. It took a huge burden off me, plus we had a great deal of fun Cruisin’ with the Colemans!

From here we go to New York, then into Canada where we have sellout screenings in Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver. From Vancouver we drop back into the US where we have a screening in Seattle. Then Portland Oregon – then we shift on down into California.

Johnnie /walker joins us in a couple of days now in New York, and he’ll be doing Q&As with us up to March 23.

It’s been interesting seeing the differences and similarites between the Australian audiences and the US audience.

Overall, the US audiences have been more demonstrative, more effusive in their praise of the film, they are happy to discuss spiritual matters more openly, and they are more interested in the transformative aspects of the Camino.

There are some questions the US audiences ask that are the same as the Australian audiences. They are:

  • How is your knee now?
    (Still buggered)
  • Why are the trails so empty?
    (Because most days we started shooting at 7pm or so to get the magic hour light – and most pilgrims have bunked down in their alburgues by this time of the evening.)
  • Why did I cast Chris Haywood as myself?
    (Because he’s a great actor)
  • To Jennifer: Has he really changed?
    (Jennifer: Yes. He now divides his life into the years before the Camino and the years after the Camino.)
  • What’s your favourite part of the Camino?
    (The Meseta,)

How are we holding up?

It’s been tough at time, I have to admit. All the driving, no real time to rest – but what’s kept us going are the wonderful people we’re meeting. Pilgrims really are extraordinary people!